_ForceD_

A couple plans to offer rail bike excursions on Portsmouth train tracks starting in April

By Sean Flynn

Newport Daily News Staff writer

(photo attached)

Rail explorers, a type of rail bike, like the ones above, will be riding the train tracks in Portsmouth from the Sakonnet River Bridge to Melville beginning in the spring.

Newport, RI - A new venture is coming to Aquidneck Island called Rail Explorers, which will use the six-mile stretch of rail line between the Sakonnet River Bridge and Melville in Portsmouth.

Mary Joy Lu and Alex Catchpoole, a wife and husband team, have successfully operated a similar venture in the Adirondack Mountains between Saranac Lake, which is near Lake Placid, New York, and Lake Clear, a 7-mile ride on rails.

They have had 26,000 riders on the Adirondack rail line since it began in 2015, Lu said.

They plan to begin operating the rail explorers - a type of rail bike - in April during Easter weekend and eventually will have 35 employees here, she said. They already have hired Rick West of Newport to be the director of Rail Explorers: Rhode Island Division.

A rail explorer is a pedalpowered vehicle that rides on railroad tracks, Lu explained. The vehicles have four steel wheels, hydraulic disc brakesand pedals for each seat.Although the rail explorers require pedaling, the steel wheels rolling on steel rails makes it an easy ride, she said.

The rail lines on Aquidneck Island have limited use so the rail explorers will not be competing for space.

The Newport & Narragansett Bay Railroad operates specialty dinner trains such as the Grand Bellevue Rail Dining Experience; Conductor Kalbfus and The Ice Cream Train; and other specialty trains such as Murder on the Rails, a 1920s “Gilded Age” who-done-it interactive play in a rail car. The trains operate out of Newport and head to Melville.

The Newport & Narragansett firm is owned by Eric Moffett, who purchased the trains in late 2014 from Robert J. Andrews, who operated the Newport Dinner Train and Newport Ice Cream Trainfor almost 20 years. The Old Colony & Newport, an allvolunteer organization dedicated to helping preserve the history of the railroad on Aquidneck Island, also operates a train on the line.

Rail Explorers is working with Moffett to coordinate train and rail bike activity, Lu said.

Freight service on the Newport Secondary Line to Fall River, Massachusetts, and on to Boston was discontinued in 1975, when rail passage over the former Sakonnet River Bridge was determined to be unsafe.

The rail bridge had been located below the passenger car bridge. The rail bridge was damaged in 1988 and its superstructure removed in 2006. The piers were demolished in 2007. When the new Sakonnet River Bridge was designed and built, there was no accommodation for a railline bridge.

Two rail explorers have been testing the ride on the Newport Secondary line between the bridge and Melville in recent weeks, Lu said.

“You have such beautiful views as well as an adventure on the tracks,” she said.

The company plans to begin operating with 13 twoseat “tandem rail explorers” and 10 four-seat “quad rail explorers.”

All the rail explorers leave the starting point at the same time, with a tour guide in the lead and a tour guide in the last rail bike. When the tour is safely across roads, the group spreads out along the track so that there is up to 300 feet between the rail bikes.

“This allows each group to enjoy the freedom of the wild and the magic of the railroad at their own pace and in their own space,” the company says on its website.

Lu said the company plans to start a Catskills New York Division in June this year, with rail bikes running on rails alongside the Esopus Creek from Phoenicia to Mount Tremper in New York.People can read more about the company on the web at railexplorers.net and on the Facebook page, Rail Explorers USA.

Lu and Catchpoole got off to a tough start as far as staying on Aquidneck Island this year.

They have been renting or staying at places short term, so they decided to look for a place where they could stay at least three of four months to get the operation going here, Lu said.

They found an advertised place on Sachuest Road in Middletown on craigslist and contacted the alleged owner by texting over a phone. He asked them to send a check for $2,300 to Dallas, which would cover the first month's rent and a deposit. They sent thecheck on Jan. 17.

When they went to the home at the end of last week, the person who answered the door said the home was owned by his uncle and he was not renting it.

They texted the alleged owner and told him the home was occupied. He texted back that they should stay in a hotel for a couple of nights until the misunderstanding could be cleared up and he would cover the hotel costs.

Lu said they knew they had been scammed and filed a police report with Middletown police. They also canceled the check, which reportedly arrived in Dallas on Saturday. The man tried to cash the check at a store with a check cashing service on Monday, and the clerk called Lu to see if it was valid. The clerk received Lu's number from the man who did not know hisscam had been uncovered, Lu said.

When the clerk learned Lu and her husband were victims of a scam, she called Dallas police and kept the man talking until police arrived. She reportedly told the man the check was being processed and he had to wait.

Lu said the man was arrested by Dallas police, who contacted her.

Middletown police did not get back to The Newport Daily News on a request for information about the incident and the arrest.

Lu and Catchpoole were taking the matter in stride, since they did not lose any money.


“We're excited by our new venture here,” Lu said. “It started on an exciting note.”


A map of the rail route in the article can be seen at this link:

https://www.gmap-pedometer.com/m/?r=7013174&rf=1

Dan

fietsbob

there are other people's, designs too a normal bike modified with a outrigger wheel and

wheel-centering additions to the bike's, wheel.

_ForceD_

I've seen those too. But I suppose that it'd be a little harder for the entire family to go for an outing that way. If this venture works, maybe in the future they'll get some of those like you mentioned. It'd be kind of fun for the competitive cyclists to have time trials.

Dan

TimothyH

Does it connect to Zwift?

fietsbob

#1, rail line is Closed. but has not been converted by a rails to trails scheme.. removing the rails.

The enterprise leases the right of way to set up their business?

jefnvk

But how do I drop them after sucking their wheel for miles?

indyfabz

Actually, it sounds like the firm still runs tourist train excursions as well as does another entity.


"The rail lines on Aquidneck Island have limited use so the rail explorers will not be competing for space.

"The Newport & Narragansett Bay Railroad operates specialty dinner trains such as the Grand Bellevue Rail Dining Experience; Conductor Kalbfus and The Ice Cream Train; and other specialty trains such as Murder on the Rails, a 1920s “Gilded Age” who-done-it interactive play in a rail car. The trains operate out of Newport and head to Melville.

"The Newport & Narragansett firm is owned by Eric Moffett, who purchased the trains in late 2014 from Robert J. Andrews, who operated the Newport Dinner Train and Newport Ice Cream Trainfor almost 20 years. The Old Colony & Newport, an allvolunteer organization dedicated to helping preserve the history of the railroad on Aquidneck Island, also operates a train on the line.

"Rail Explorers is working with Moffett to coordinate train and rail bike activity, Lu said."

rumrunn6

wonder what kind of insurance waiver they're gonna make ppl sign releasing them of any responsibility for any reason

indyfabz

Probably no different from a waiver you would sign to participate in a charity bike ride. I work in the freight rail industry and don't see any appreciable safety concern caused by the seemingly inconsistent uses. Train traffic sounds minimal, and temporal separation of the two activities can easily be accomplished.

jefnvk

Sounds like a place we had back in West Michigan, a few miles of historical train lines were left in place when the rest was ripped up, and a historical society runs an antique train up and down them a couple times a week for school children and tourists. No actual rail traffic taking place.

Milton Keynes

Experts Warn Number Of Retirees Will Completely Overwhelm Scenic Railway Industry By 2030 - The Onion - America's Finest News Source

_ForceD_

The train line in question is on an island, and the rail bridge off the island was dismantled several years ago. The approximately 12 miles of track that remain are owned by the state, and the two tourist train companies that operate on it are required to get clearance by the state before they operate the trains...which is on average about one train per day -- many days no train, some days two or three. But those tourists trains don't/can't operate with much velocity. The tracks are in very poor condition (my father was a retired railroader so I was around tracks a lot with him as a kid so I can tell). I think the max speed limit on them about 20 mph, and I think the trains actually go slower than that. When I'm on my road bike riding along the adjacent road, I ride faster than the trains. In fact, back in my early 40s when I still had a decent bit of running speed...there were times that I passed the train while running. At any rate...the trains only operate on the southern six or so miles of track. This rail bike operation wants to use the northern six miles where there trains do usually go (there's a link to a map in my OP that shows where the rail bikes would operate).

But, the tracks are used by trains so infrequently that I wish they (the state) would just take up the rails and make it a legitimate rails-to-trails project. It would get much use, that is more people-per-mile-per-day use, than it gets now.

Dan

fietsbob

There's ones in Oregon, the one to the coast From PDX has a washout draping the rails in the air, so the likelihood you will meet a train there is Nil.

I was last used briefly in 2011.. for an excursion train..